TV loves me too

I stayed up last night to watch a documentary called "Jihad: The Men and Ideas Behind the Just War" which was endlessly fascinating. And a little terrifying. It was comprised mostly of interviews of people who were friends with bin Laden and other al-Qaida leaders, as well as academics who would look into the camera and casually say things like "Basically, if al-Quaida gets a nuclear weapon, they're going to use it. They're not interested in deterring anyone." I'm starting to get a better grasp on how the current movement gained such an ugly, extremist slant. At one point they were describing the death of an Egyptian official, saying "al-Zaharwi (sp?) and his group had decided this official was no longer a Muslim, and therefore it was okay to kill him." Well, damn. If they can say that about someone who professes the Muslim faith, then clearly there is no hope for the rest of us. I can also see (tho not necessarily agree with) the train of thought that says we should stop terrorists there rather than let them get us here. Both sides of the issue! Ahh! Confusing! Add to that Rudy Giuliani is thinking about running for President, and if he does I MIGHT SERIOUSLY HAVE TO CONSIDER VOTING FOR HIM! Especially since I haven't heard anything from the blue camp other than "Hilary! Hilary! Hilary!" Saints preserve us.

I was also thinking that it's funny that the Secretary of War* was renamed the Secretary of Defence after WWII, since we seem to have declared a lot of wars since then. But then I realised that maybe we ARE defending ourselves, going overseas and stopping terrorism. By declaring wars and invading countries. Right? Right? Aww, this is hard. I want to go be a hermit.



*The first Secretary of War was General Henry Knox, originally a seller of London books, who brought captured guns from Fort Ticonderoga which were used to sucessfully kick the British out of Boston in 1776. Later, George Lucas would use the Dixon-Ticonderoga #2 pencil (mentioned in the Mel Brook's musical "The Producers) to write Star Wars. I'm such a geek.